


Peeled Orange

by Valgus



Series: Nest of the Crows [8]
Category: Haikyuu!!
Genre: Alternate Universe - Boarding School, Drabble, M/M, Sick Character
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-04-07
Updated: 2016-04-07
Packaged: 2018-05-31 15:25:18
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,837
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6475693
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Valgus/pseuds/Valgus
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>"Thank you for taking care of me when I'm sick, Kageyama."</p><p>"... Don't mention it. Just get better soon, okay?"</p>
            </blockquote>





	Peeled Orange

After breakfast in the dining hall, Hinata slumped into Kageyama’s bed instead of changing into uniform like Kageyama did.

Kageyama was buttoning up his black uniform and frowned down at the boy who lied on his bed like he owned it.

“Hey, Hinata, wear your uniform already,” he grunted.

But when Hinata lifted his face, he was so red all over; his forehead, his ears, even his chest was so red.

“Hey, are you okay?” Kageyama stepped closer, looking back at Hinata who stared at him with drowsy eyes.

“I feel kind of funny,” giggled the smaller boy.

Kageyama placed his right palm on Hinata’s forehead and hissed. The dumbass was burning.

“You have temperature,” said Kageyama curtly. “Lie down properly. I’ll go the dorm's doctor and get you some medicine or something.”

Hinata was already halfway wriggling his hoodie out when he nodded, head hidden somewhere in the fabric.

(It wasn’t even Hinata’s hoodie to begin with. It was Kageyama’s. Hinata had worn his own hoodie for breakfast, but he said he still felt so cold that Kageyama lent him an extra hoodie. The temperature perhaps explained why Hinata still felt so cold despite wearing a thick clothing already.)

“Kageyama,” mumbled Hinata drowsily when Kageyama reached the door.

“What?” snapped the black haired boy.

Hinata made sleepy, weak smile, “Thank you for getting the doctor and medicine for me.”

Kageyama sighed but smiled, “Don’t worry. Just rest properly and behave, okay?”

“Okay,” said Hinata as he shuffled around to reposition his body.

Kageyama closed the door to 220A with a faint smile and to Hinata whose smile looked way too bright for someone who was currently down with temperature.

*)*

“Hello, Kageyama-kun.”

“Good morning, Takuma-san.”

“You’re very early. Do you need anything from me? Do you need another spray for strained muscle?”

“No, not this time, Takuma-san.”

Takuma-san was the male dorm’s doctor. A man on his late thirties, he bear resemblance of an older Sugawara Koushi, but with light brown hair and with no beauty mark present on his face. Kageyama had saw Takuma-san for a couple of times, mostly for pain relief from exercising a bit too much and for waterproof Band-Aids stocks.

“My roommate has temperature.”

“Ah, Hinata-kun? Really? He’s not the first this month. Here, take his temperature and if it was above 38.9 degree Celsius, give him one of this.”

“That’s all?” Kageyama received the digital thermometer in clear case and a strip of medicine.

The doctor nodded, “Just make sure he rest and drink plenty of fluids.”

“Okay.”

Kageyama left with an odd feeling that he was too freaked out for Hinata's temperature and Takuma-san seemed to think there was something more out of it. But with the imagine of Hinata, tiny and red to the chest, popped up into his head, he hurried his steps to return to his roommate.

*)*

When Kageyama returned to 220A, Hinata was looking up at the bottom of bunk bed, face red as lobster, and moved his head very, very slowly upon the sound of Kageyama re-entering their shared bedroom.

“Hello,” Hinata said. He sounded funny when his voice was an octave higher, presumably from the temperature. “How was it?”

Kageyama pulled out the thermometer from his pocket, “I’m going to stick this in your mouth for about forty seconds.”

“Okay,” Hinata replied sluggishly and shuffled to make room so that Kageyama could sit on the bottom bunk’s edge.

Hinata was awfully quiet and awfully obedient when he was down with temperature, Kageyama noticed. Hinata usually filled the silent Kageyama left with much chatter and questioned almost everything Kageyama asked him to, seven times out of ten. But now, he lifted his tongue submissively and just stared at Kageyama through half-lidded eyes throughout the process.

Kageyama had opened a stopwatch application on his phone to make sure he had left the tool at appropriate time, beside opening browser who told him how to take temperature orally with digital thermometer.

He looked down at the flashing 38.7 degree Celsius.

“I think you can just rest for now,” concluded Kageyama with awkward cough.

Hinata nodded meekly before Kageyama left the edge of his bed for washing the thermometer.

When Kageyama returned, Hinata was still awake. He looked smaller when he was ill. Weirder, too, because Kageyama thought that Hinata would be much healthier than him with his strong power of will or something. He always moved so much now that he didn't move at all despite being awake, it almost felt like seeing mean Suga-senpai or meek Daichi-senpai.

“Hey, Kageyama?”

“Yeah?” answered Kageyama, who was now slumping down to his study’s chair.

“Aren’t you going to go to school today?” Hinata asked in high-pitched voice.

“No,” said Kageyama, who felt weirdly hurt to think that Hinata thought he’d left his sick roommate by himself. “I sent some messages to the school. It should be fine. Beside…” he sighed as Hinata looked sadly guilty, “Today has math, English, and history, and I’m glad I’m here instead of there. So thank you for that, Hinata.”

Hinata laughed weakly before he breathed heavily.

“I feel so uncomfortable,” the orange head exhaled. “I don’t want to be left alone. This is my first time feeling this sick since I entered the dorm.”

Kageyama pouted, “Of course I know. I’ve been your roommate since the beginning. Don’t think about things too much. Just rest and I’ll get you something nice to eat for lunch.”

“Okay,” Hinata made a half, sluggish smile and Kageyama walked to him to tucked Hinata in properly.

When Kageyama straightened his back again, Hinata was staring at him. “What is it?” the setter raised one eyebrow.

“Thank you for taking care of me when I’m sick, Kageyama,” Hinata smiled, way too bright and happy-looking for someone with temperature.

Kageyama immediately wished he were the one who was ill, not Hinata. Hinata didn’t deserve it. “… Don’t mention it,” Kageyama coughed, like he had forgotten how to response in the face of Hinata’s smile. “Just get better soon, okay?”

Hinata mumbled an agreement as he dozed off to sleep, much to Kageyama’s relief.

*)*

Hinata dreaded being sick, but when he already was, he was very unsure on what to do. His mother would take care of him when he was ill, but now she was miles away and Hinata was almost sure he’d have to spend uncomfortable hours alone in 220A while waited for his fever to come down.

But he was wrong.

It was probably sometime around lunch when he opened his eyes and saw Kageyama sat on his study’s chair, frowning to a small pile of orange.

He caught Hinata’s eyes and his lips twitched in what looked like a ghost of smile, “Hey. How are you feeling?”

Hinata shrugged and made indescribable noise indicating that he felt slightly better.

Kageyama nodded, “I see. Oh, I had some orange I haven’t told you about. Do you want some? Well, I’m peeling some already, now, so…”

Kageyama looked so fidgety and unusually shy that Hinata wondered whether this was the first time he had to care for a sick person. Then Hinata remembered that, unlike him, Kageyama had no sibling, whereas Hinata had the experiences of caring when Natsu was sick.

“Yes, peeled orange sounds good,” smiled Hinata, who thought that the timid and unsure Kageyama was absolutely adorable. It was not Kageyama-like and it was rather refreshing to see.

In the end, Kageyama peeled three oranges for Hinata and handfed it to the giggly middle blocker. Suddenly, being ill got way too fun for Hinata. Kageyama took his job of handfeeding Hinata very seriously and Hinata’s heart felt like they skipped a beat whenever Kageyama brought his fingers close to his mouth.

Kageyama got them food from dining hall for lunch. It had soup with plenty of vegetables, fortunately. Even Tsukishima and Yamaguchi, who lived next door by 220B, whom they shared a kitchen with, had made extra time to nip back into the dorm so they could see how Hinata was doing.

Tsukishima made some mean remarks on how dumb people couldn’t get sick, but he gave Hinata a bottle of his favourite vanilla milk from 220's kitchen fridge and his ear had got a little red from that. Yamaguchi gave Hinata some of the peaches he got sent from home and wished Hinata well soon so the odd duo could return to practice as soon as possible. Before the lesson after lunch started, Tsukishima made one last trip back at 220B to shove a hard covered, illustrated book on dinosaur to Hinata’s hand.

“Read this. You’re probably bored from sleeping and just laying down all day.”

And Hinata was. When he gave Tsukishima his thanks, Tsukishima actually smiled.

Hinata spent the rest of his afternoon telling Kageyama obscure facts about dinosaur and told him at the end of the book that he’d like it very much to be at the top of brontosaurus’ head for once. He also made some weird comparison, like how a Tyrannosaurus would equal in term of weight to 128 Kageyama.

("Why the hell are you compared my weight to a dead, giant lizard?" grunted Kageyama, who was honestly amused, probably more amused than he would like to admit to Hinata.

"Because you're heavier than me?" suggested Hinata, though it wasn't much for an answer. "But to think that there should be 128 of you to weigh down a Tyrannosaurus is just bizarre, huh..."

"Where the hell would you find a 128 of me, anyway?" Kageyama almost laughed at that.

"I know, right?" Hinata was the one who was laughing. "Even _one_ you is terrifying enough- ah! No! Please don't kill me! I am sick!")

Kageyama looked secretly thankful that Hinata had an activity and that he didn’t really need to humour his ill friend with anything.

“Maybe you should rest again, Hinata,” Kageyama said, after placing his calloused palm once again on Hinata’s forehead.

“I agree,” yawned Hinata. “Don’t you want to take a nap too, Kageyama? You can take my top bunk.”

But Kageyama didn’t seem like he felt comfortable with taking his eyes off Hinata, so he grabbed Hinata’s mattress from the top bunk, laid it by the floor, and laid there.

“Will this do?” he asked, head already on Hinata’s pillow.

“Yes,” said Hinata, who felt strangely happy to get an excuse to watch Kageyama taking nap.

Kageyama fell asleep faster than him and Hinata thought that caring for him must’ve take a lot of energy—at least in thought—for Kageyama.

When Hinata woke up just before dinnertime, Kageyama already took shower and asked how Hinata was doing. Feeling infinitely better, Hinata woke up and showered too. The warm water washed all his sluggishness away and by the time the two joined Tsukishima and Yamaguchi for dinner on the stairs, Hinata thought that it’d be lovely to have a day off once in a while, even though he had one just because he was sick.

**Author's Note:**

> I don't think it's much, but I want to write caring and slightly unsure Kageyama being very nice to Hinata. As for the temperature stuffs, I am indebted to [mayoclinic.org](http://www.mayoclinic.org/diseases-conditions/fever/in-depth/fever/art-20050997) and [clevelandclinic.org](https://my.clevelandclinic.org/health/diseases_conditions/hic_Fever/hic_How_to_Take_Your_Temperature).
> 
> The doctor Takuma-san's name is from Japanese 拓 (taku) meaning "expand, open, support" and 真 (ma) meaning "real, genuine". The more you know!
> 
> Thank you for reading and I hope you enjoyed it.


End file.
